The Reasons Why
by pagerunner
Summary: Carlos has heard a lot of theories about why he fell so hard for Cecil Palmer, and he has his own questions about where it's all heading. Tonight, though, he's gathering his own evidence - and putting it to the inevitable test. Carlos/Cecil, no particular spoilers, although it hints slightly toward "Condos."


Carlos had heard a lot of theories about why he'd fallen so hard for Cecil Palmer. Despite all the affectionate teasing, though, and the most popular notions from his compatriots, it was moments like this that proved everyone was falling short of the mark.

Because it wasn't just the voice that was the problem.

Sure, the voice was enough to handle all on its own, but what it revealed about Cecil's personality was also telling - alternately warm and foreboding, innocent and far too knowing, brooding, teasing, true. And it wasn't the only thing about him that was captivating. Not in the least. Taken all together, it could be a lot to absorb.

So it was the sort of thing that required study, really. Lots of observation. Deeply personal, and admittedly somewhat biased, analysis.

He was starting to have some theories of his own about where all this was heading, in fact, but a little additional data collection never hurt.

That particular night, Carlos was trying to do just that, from across a shared booth at the Moonlite All-Nite Diner. It was as late as the name implied. Cecil had driven across town after his broadcast to meet Carlos over mugs of coffee that were probably inadvisable at this hour. Of course, they were probably inadvisable at any hour. Carlos still wasn't sure _what _that aftertaste was, and he had half a mind to run it through a chemical analysis back at the lab, just to be sure of what he was subjecting himself to.

For now, though, Cecil was keeping him plenty occupied.

"Did you listen to the community calendar today?" he was asking, eyes bright and hands mobile. Carlos made a small, affirmative hum while he watched those long fingers punctuate Cecil's sentences. "That concert might be entertaining, as long as you aren't worried about the portents for the encore, anyway. We could always leave before that starts. That is, if you're interested…"

He smiled over his mug. "Sure. Sounds like a nice evening out."

Cecil nodded, pleased, and continued, making a long, sweeping gesture as he spoke. Carlos watched his hand's path through the air, the closing gesture, the way Cecil's fingertips curled back in against his palm.

"…so if we meet after my shift, at the-" He paused. "Carlos?"

"Hmm?"

"I'm sorry. You just seem distracted."

He took a gulp of coffee, regretted it, and shook his head with a jerk. "No, I…well." He put down the mug. "Maybe a little. But by you. I promise I'm paying attention."

Cecil gave him a quizzical smile. Carlos explained by gesturing toward Cecil's hands. "I'm just…watching you."

"Hah. My skills as an orator may be in question if my _hands _are that much more interesting."

"Not at all. It's just…I don't always get to _see_ you talk. Wish I could."

Cecil's expression changed slightly. As he considered what to say next, he slid his thumb back and forth along his fingertips. Thoughtfully. Almost certainly deliberately. Even underneath the off-kilter music in the diner, the murmur of other conversations and the occasional shriek and rattle from the kitchen, Carlos could hear that soft little sound of friction, the rhythmic slide of skin against skin.

He swallowed hard.

"Go on," Carlos forced himself to say, before the silence between them could get even more charged. There was a waitress walking past, and he felt suddenly conspicuous. "Plans. Dinner, and the…"

"Concert," Cecil said evenly. He watched, too, until the waitress was gone.

"It was on Thursday, you said?"

"Friday. Thursday's the ritual at City Hall."

"Ah. Can't miss that."

Cecil's attention returned fully to Carlos. "I think you might have missed something about the _nature _of that ritual."

"Well." He leaned closer. "Enlighten me, then."

Looking a little sly, Cecil did.

"It involves all the Council members." His left hand marked out their positions around a lightly sketched building. "No one's ever witnessed the entire ceremony, at least not without being re-educated afterward, but I understand it begins with a chant, by these members here…"

This time, his gesture - over the salt shaker, as if it had become the representation of a peculiar city monument - seemed deliberately sculpted into a come-hither curl. Carlos swallowed again. Cecil's sleeve slid back, and the sinuous curves of several tattoos became visible at his wrist.

"And that part of the ritual goes on for a while. Building things up." He made little gestures to suggest rising tension. "But soon enough they all gather together at one point."

"Where?"

Cecil tapped the table beside Carlos' empty mug. There, his finger trailed around in a counterclockwise circle, lazy and hypnotic. His voice lowered. "That's the important part. Of course everything gets more powerful when they're closer."

The tilt to his smile was unmistakable. Carlos laughed ruefully. "All right, now you're just messing with me."

"Me?" Cecil touched his own chest, fingers splayed wide, an expression of false innocence plain upon his face. "I'm only trying to explain-"

His hand moved again, making an expressive shrug. Carlos watched, entranced, and then - deciding Cecil had had _more _than enough opportunity to have his fun - he reached out and caught that hand in midair. Cecil startled at the contact.

So did Carlos, taken by the sudden warmth of it, but he tried his best not to show it.

"I didn't say I _minded _that you're messing with me," he said.

Cecil, briefly wordless, turned his hand in Carlos' grip, then let his thumb start moving again. It traced back and forth against Carlos' inner wrist, drawing all of his focus to that point of contact, of contrast, to that little, intimate caress.

"Good," Cecil said, quiet and low.

Carlos, whose whole body was slowly beginning to ache, couldn't help but agree.

Somewhere past the private space of their table, another pair of patrons had started a warm, low-pitched conversation in Unmodified Sumerian. Beyond that, a new song had kicked in on the jukebox, all sideways and swirling and seductive. The sounds blurred pleasantly in Carlos' ears, along with the faint sound of Cecil's breathing and the rhythm of his pulse, beating faster now under Carlos' fingertips.

"There's only one problem, really," he heard himself saying in counterpoint, as he slid one foot forward until their legs were brushing, too.

Cecil flushed, but his reply was a simple, inquisitive, "What?"

"This is still a respectable family establishment." He smiled. "And I don't think the owners would like it much if I did what I really want to do right now."

Cecil licked dry lips. Carlos didn't even make him ask. He just stroked Cecil's wrist this time, gave a speculative glance down the length of the table, looked back up, and waited for Cecil to get the idea.

It didn't take long. Going by the low sound Cecil had just barely suppressed, he'd arrived at _exactly _the same place Carlos had.

It was then, of course, that they got interrupted by the waitress.

Carlos and Cecil both drew back hurriedly, although their fingertips still touched across the untested table. The waitress considered them both, then gave them a perky smile.

"We charge extra for that, just so you know," she said helpfully. "For cleanup. And to pay off the Secret Police about the noise complaints."

"Oh," Carlos said, coloring yet further. "Um-"

She grinned wider and lifted a pot. "More coffee?"

The music skirled into something like a laugh. Cecil, doing the literal same, said, "Maybe we should square up the bill instead, and then-"

"My place?" Carlos suggested.

Cecil's expression warmed. The waitress winked knowingly at them before she stepped away. Even as quickly as she was walking, it felt like an interminable wait for the bill.

And the instant they could, they nearly ran for Carlos' car.

...

Not so very long afterwards, Carlos found himself thinking about probabilities.

It wasn't just numbers and analysis that he meant, although that was part of it. The entirety was something much more raw, less constrained by calculations. Whatever the odds might be that he'd ever meet anyone like Cecil, let alone end up here, with him, like this - that was where he stopped being able to _analyze_ much of anything. Words like "serendipity" shouldn't have much place in a scientist's lexicon, but it was one of the only things that fit.

Well, either that or something much darker, stranger and more Night Valean, really, but he had a hard time believing there could be anything sinister about this_. _

They were, after all, up against a floor-to-ceiling window beside the porch door. Cecil had his hands braced against the window, leaving telltale smudges with every movement. His rapid, rough breaths fogged the glass, each one a visible sign of the pleasure practically radiating from him. Carlos, meanwhile, settled his hands around Cecil's bare hips and kissed the back of his neck, doing his best just to breathe at all.

Theoretically speaking, anyone could see them here. Of course, in Night Vale, where wasn't that true? And why _not _have a view of the entire city, the skyline, the radio tower blinking in the distance, while they did this? He couldn't resist the idea when it struck him, no matter how reckless. And Cecil, wide-eyed and astonished at him but just as carried away, had said yes. And yes. And _yes, _again. It was yes with every kiss and touch and hungry tug at clothing, until they were pressed together like this, _right _at the edge, under the full view of that brilliantly clear night sky.

"Carlos," Cecil said, his voice tense. Carlos watched him glance at his own flushed reflection in the window, then turn away trembling, pressing the side of his head against the glass. When he breathed deep, his whole body moved with it. The friction alone-

Carlos shook, hard, and held on even tighter. It took a second to manage words. "What?"

"Why did you stop?"

Carlos laughed. He was trying to drink it all in, was the truth of it. The wild sky, the heat in his veins, Cecil against him like this…

"Maybe…I'm just messing with _you, _now."

There was a laugh, and a faint, fervent curse. "Point…proven. Now _move." _

Carlos buried another laugh against Cecil's shoulder. All the gearing up he'd done to try to take charge, and it still only took one word to shift the balance. But he loved it anyway. He smoothed his hands up Cecil's sides and down again, feeling him shift and shiver. Then he levered himself back again. Slowly. Feeling every inexorable inch of the slide.

And Carlos couldn't look away from Cecil's hand as it skidded down the windowpane, the sound cutting sharply through Cecil's moan.

That was all it took, really, to set him the rest of the way loose.

They both came soon after - Carlos deep inside him, Cecil with a sudden spatter against the glass. His last shout echoed endlessly in Carlos' ears. And after a few moments of breath-catching, their muscles quivering with the effort of staying upright, they both ended up sitting in an exhausted heap right there on the floor, propped against the end of the couch.

They kept holding onto each other for a while, as they slowly settled back down.

"So who's cleaning this one up?" Carlos murmured into Cecil's ear, studying the window. He still felt light-headed, and his vision was a little hazy, but the evidence they'd left behind was obvious. "Because I'm _really _going to be scandalizing the neighbors this time…"

They both shook with silent laughter, until Cecil leaned over and kissed him soundly. That distracted them long enough for the question to stop mattering much.

"My car's still at the diner," Cecil murmured eventually. One hand began playing in Carlos' hair. "Does this mean I'm staying over?"

"Sure hope so. I'm in no shape to drive."

Cecil nuzzled in against his neck. "Good."

"Good that you're staying, or good that you've reduced me to jelly?"

"Mmm-hmm."

The non-answer was reason enough to laugh, but Cecil's hand had already started to wander, too. Carlos' head tilted back against the couch as Cecil's fingertips drifted over his skin. "I'm not sure who's the worst influence on whom, here…"

"Equal, I think."

Carlos looked at his boyfriend, who'd made his way to Carlos' collarbone for a quick kiss. He was now glancing up in a way that made a shiver run up Carlos' spine. There was hope there, and obvious affection - but perhaps most notably, wonder. Whatever unlikely conjunction of events had led them here, Cecil obviously felt just as lucky about it as Carlos did. That floored Carlos still.

Fairly literally, as it turned out. The thought made him smile.

"We do work well together, don't we?" he said. "And…not just like this."

Cecil almost replied, but went quiet and thoughtful at the last. A smile of his own lingered at the corners of his mouth. Then he drew back and got to his feet. For a minute they still clasped hands, perfectly wordless. Then Cecil murmured, "I'll take care of the window."

He padded off toward the kitchen for a cloth. Carlos watched him go, admittedly enjoying the view. Then he leaned back again. Off beyond the dirty windowpane, the radio tower still blinked its signal, and the constellations shone on, vivid and endless.

Whatever the stars might have thought of the show, Carlos would never know, but they seemed to glimmer a little brighter just the same.

...

In the morning, not too early, Carlos drove a yawning Cecil back to the diner for his car.

The air was crisp and the sky brightening into color, and the sounds of a waking city rose everywhere around them. Birdsong. Traffic. That distant, eldritch rumbling that had been going on for a week. Carlos and his team were due for another day out to study it.

For now, he was looking at Cecil in the passenger seat and thinking far too hard about other, more personal things.

It was getting harder and harder to do this: to let Cecil go, or to have to leave, whichever way applied each time. It was feeling so natural to be a unit that part of Carlos simply wanted to _stay_. But he doubted Cecil would be willing to give up his long-time home for Carlos' rental, and Carlos moving into _his _little space instead - especially with all that equipment and ephemera in tow - seemed like far too much to ask.

_Sometimes I wonder, _Carlos thought, while he maneuvered into an empty spot near Cecil's car, _if I need to make things here a lot more permanent… _

He cut the engine. In the sudden silence that followed, he watched the sun glint off of Cecil's glasses, studied the curves and angles of his silhouetted face. Studied his hands again, as Cecil nervously fiddled with his collar. Always so expressive, those hands. Always.

And then Cecil was facing him straight on.

"I guess this is my stop," he said, with a tentative smile. "Carlos…?"

The word hung in the air. Carlos was picturing Cecil as he'd looked an hour ago, all comfortably rumpled and sleepy in his bed, and reaching across to touch him…

He shook himself. "Sorry. Yes?"

"Thanks for the ride."

"Of course."

Cecil undid his seat belt, thought over something of his own, then leaned closer. "And for the night," he said, more softly.

Carlos blinked, his lips parting to say something. But Cecil stopped him with a kiss, warm and gentle and filled with, suddenly, _so much _that all Carlos could do was give himself to it. A soft sort of arousal crept over him, and his own hand was lifting to touch Cecil's face when, unfortunately, it ended. Cecil had drawn back, wearing a crooked, almost regretful smile. He murmured a "goodbye" before popping the door and slipping outside.

Carlos sat there in silence until Cecil drove away. Dust clouds hung over the parking lot, like a mild reproach.

_He doesn't want to leave, either, _Carlos thought. _And you know it. _

He took a deep breath. Scattered thoughts still spun through his head about his work here, and financial logistics, and the peculiarities of Night Vale realtors…and most of all, Cecil. Always, and most importantly, Cecil.

_You don't need any more evidence, _he told himself._ You just need to decide._

He looked at himself in the rear view mirror, squared his shoulders, and started the car. Soon enough he was on the move again, heading toward the offices down the road. He'd seen some new signs posted on the way here, after all. Something about real estate opportunities. Condos, he'd read.

And he started to smile at the very idea, deciding it really did sound like a good place to start.


End file.
